McNugget-
I don't think we'll see the downturns with the associated cyclic hiring and furloughing that we've seen in the past in the US. The legacy carriers are down to three through mergers, and that had to happen. It happened to the railroads in the 1920s and it had to happen to the airlines. There were too many seats for too long after deregulation. As an east to west coast commuter these are the highest sustained fares I have ever seen. The American/USAir merger basically relagated me to Southwest for commutes. Riding on a ZED fare hasn't been an option since June. And for a lot of the time since summer 2008 it hasn't been. The US airlines learned their lesson and drastically reduced excess capacity. If you find a wide open flight for a month its soon downgraded to smaller equipment.
In regard to what the US industry requires for experience, a lot of that is also the result of deregulation and the cycles of hiring and firing, or the stagnant markets you referred to. But it wasn't always that way. Before 1990 a commercial license was usually all that was needed. In the 1960s some guys were hired and trained for their MEL. The advent of flight schools that ran two or three day ATP courses in the late 80s soon made an ATP a requirement although guys were starting in the FE seat. Anybody with 1500 hours ran off to get an ATP. Southwest became popular so they required a type. The advent of regional airlines and stagnation meant guys were available with turbine PIC so that became a requirement to start as an FE on a 727. Depending on supply and demand, it might be 500 or 1000 hours. But what did that actually mean in terms of experience? As we know the US is very much "train to proficiency", and that is a good thing most of the time. Sometimes it isn't. Fear of lawsuits, demands to get people through, who you know, especially at the regional level can factor in. I spent 1989-1996 in the US regionals and flew with a few Captains who had logbook hours in the left seat but shouldn't have been in command of a dingy much less an airplane. So they had 1000 hours turbine PIC, without any airmanship skills.
So these "experience" levels are basically screening tools, nothing more. Look at the first post. Why is 3500 in military transports OK but you need 5000 in civilian transports? Aren't the civilians flying into the same airports in regionals and thus familiar? Is JetBlue going to start flying into unimproved strips with night vision goggles? Sure the military training system is better and a known quantity but then 3500 civilian with much more practical experience ought to be just as good. I've been here ten years now but when I was hired the interview had a lot to do with flying airplanes. In the US its become a PC interview. "what will you do if the lead flight attendant smells alcohol on the Captain's breath?" "Captain wants to bust minimums, what do you do?" Yeah, I've had lots of captains want to bust minimums. As in zero in almost 30 years. "Tell us about a time this or that or the other thing happened." Its crap to avoid a technical interview that might disqualify some people.
Anyway, the US industry isn't always all its cracked up to be. It was long ago for sure, but not so much now. The salaries are getting better, and the contracts are far better, but as far as experience, why does the guy in the right seat need 1500 hours turbine PIC? Their flight and duty time regs stink. They always have. You haven't had fun until you've had a "legal" rest that basically gave you five hours to sleep.
So "experience" is a relative thing. What counts as experience at JetBlue in many cases wouldn't mean much in practical experience here. The flying is very different. Many of those "competitive" at JetBlue wouldn't even be able to make a position report here if they were hired as DEFOs.